


mean what you mean

by orphan_account



Series: a little soon (to bring you home) [2]
Category: The Pacific (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canon Rewrite, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Happy Ending, Implied Relationships, M/M, Period Typical Attitudes, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Post-War
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-04
Updated: 2017-04-04
Packaged: 2018-10-14 15:28:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,443
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10539282
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Eugene doesn't come home alone.





	

**Author's Note:**

> this is solely based upon the hbo war series.
> 
> sorry for any typos.
> 
> title was taken from ['day' by buddy holiday.](https://ztapes.bandcamp.com/album/victoria-street)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sid’s got Eugene’s letter tucked away neatly in his pocket on the day he goes to pick him up from the station. It doesn’t say much—it only details an estimate on when the train should arrive and a polite request for a lift home. Which doesn’t come as much of a surprise; when he relays the information to Mister and Missus Sledge, they smile, relief plain on their faces.

Sid’s mind catalogues a series of details as the train pulls up into the station, comes to a stop, and people start filing out: Eugene is one of the last ones out; he looks like he’s in one piece; and he isn’t alone. It takes him a moment to acknowledge that: Eugene didn’t come home alone. Sid blinks at that. It takes him another moment to realize it’s another marine beside him, following closely when he waves Eugene over.

Eugene coming home would have been a quiet, awkward affair if he’d returned to Mobile alone. It isn’t, though. It’s awkward, but Shelton—if Sid’s remembering right—has a way of filling up the space with each inhale-hold-exhale of his cigarette, hooded eyes wandering idly across the landscape until they settle on Sid. Sid doesn’t think he cared for Shelton much when he knew him, but he hadn’t really known him—only been weary of the look in his eye and how he dug gold out of dead Japs. Shelton had a way of looking at a man and making them unnerved simply by being in the same place as him. He’s got a way about him that not many men had—but it’s one he recognizes. Some, infinitesimal part of him wonders why and how someone like Eugene got mixed up with _him_.

Sid shakes Eugene’s hand; Sid shakes Shelton’s, too, but the grip is loose, like Shelton doesn’t much care for him either; however the happening is civil enough that they load up their gear and get into Sid’s father’s automobile without any incidents.

Shelton fills in the silence, but the space is still awkward. Sid can feel something in the air, thick with things unsaid; he recalls a similar experience when he was with Hoosier, Leckie, Chuckler, and Runner back when they first hit Guadalcanal, when they were drinking Jap wine and all he could smell was rotten coconuts, sea salt, and cigarette smoke. It’s different here, though: Sid only saw Eugene for a day when Eugene first landed. Shelton, though—they must have been through it together the whole time. It’s the only thing that makes sense of his unexpected presence.

In the back of the car, Shelton smokes his cigarette down to the butt and then puts it out on the heel of his boot. He doesn’t seem to care much if he gets ash on the upholstery. His eyes are trained on the outside, and Eugene’s smoking his pipe in silence.

It feels a lot like maybe Sid shouldn’t even be in the car with them.

When they reach the house, Eugene and Snafu get out of the car and sling their bags over their shoulders, standing close together like they’re still in someplace that’s not home, where the only thing they knew was the man in the foxhole next to them. It’s an uncomfortable thought, because Sid rotated home before the end of the war, and he had to hear about his friends getting hit after he shipped out towards home, and there’s some part of him that still feels slightly sick at the thought, but when Mister and Missus Sledge come out of the house, those thoughts of his evaporate.

Shelton stands awkwardly off to the side next to Sid as Eugene is embraced by his parents and his brother. Introductions come to an uneasy stop when they notice Shelton shifting his weight from one foot from the other.

Eugene says: _he was in K company with me_. Sid hears: _he got me through the war_. Judging by the look on Shelton’s face, the sentiment isn’t exactly one-sided. Mister and Missus Sledge welcome him anyway, even though he came to Alabama uninvited and unannounced. Later, when Mister and Missus Sledge pull Sid aside to ask him about it, he tells him it’s probably for the best, though he doesn’t know if he quite believes that himself.

Supper is awkward, at first. No one knows what to say. But then Eugene’s brother starts talking, and then Eugene asks after Mary Houston, and then they’re talking again. Sid’s not dense; he notes how Eugene and Shelton don’t say much. It’s a lot like they don’t know what to say, or how to say it, especially since they’ve been living in a war since they left American soil. He remembers that feeling, coming back—but it’s changed a bit now.

Eugene excuses himself to go smoke out in the yard. Shelton rises to join him—automatically, without much thought—but Mister and Missus Sledge fix him with a look that’s got him hesitating, stuck in a motion that would have left him turning towards the door.

“Thank you, Merriel,” Mister Sledge says, words polite and stilted, even though it’s Misses Sledge whose eyes are shining, “for bringing Eugene back to us.”

Sid doesn’t think that Merriel could possibly be this boy’s name. It just doesn’t fit him as well as what he heard Eugene call him— _Snafu_.

Shelton only nods, looking out of sorts, and then leaves the dining room.

Afterwards, when Sid passes the open doorway leading out to the yard, he stops to eavesdrop. It’s not entirely right of him—Eugene deserves his peace on the first day being home from war—but he does it anyway.

In the fading light of late evening, cigarette smoke rises above the two silhouettes sitting side by side in the grass, leaning back. Like they’re back on a beach in a place a marine wouldn’t call home if he died in it.

Sid squints to make out the moving shapes in the growing dark: Shelton takes a long drag of his cigarette, and then scooches closer to Eugene, until they’re shoulder to shoulder. Sid’s known Eugene long enough to recognize the slight slump in his shoulders when Shelton ends up leaning against him. Something in his chest twinges at the sight.

“How’s it feel,” he hears Shelton drawl, “bein’ civilized again, Sledgehammer?”

Sid inhales sharply at the nickname. Shelton says it the same way he calls Eugene ‘Gene’ when no one’s eyes are on them.

A pause—then a sigh. “It’s all right,” is Eugene’s reply. The bone-deep exhaustion they carried back from the war is audible for a split second, and then it’s gone.

The rest, Sid can’t make out. Maybe it’s because he’s letting their words on deaf ears. Honestly, he doesn’t know if he wants to hear it. He’s known the Sledge family forever, as long as their granddaddies knew each other and before that, too, but he knows that things are different now. Things have changed.

After allowing himself a few more moments of lingering—of wondering—he bids the Sledges good night, and goes on home. He visits in the morning—as requested by Missus Sledge—before everyone’s up. Well, almost everyone. He didn’t mean to come early; the sun’s barely up, but he figured early was more polite than late. He smells smoke and peers around the southwest corner of the house to find Eugene and Shelton leaned up against side, just under Eugene’s open bedroom window. A cigarette hangs limply from between Shelton’s lips; he smokes idly while Eugene rests his head on his shoulder. It doesn’t look like either of them got much sleep the night before.

Just as he’s about to turn around, he notices that Shelton’s eyes are on him. Neither of them move for what feels like the longest minute in history. Then, slowly, as to not disturb Eugene, Shelton fits two knuckles around his cigarette, takes a drag, and settles his hand on his knee. He blinks, once, lazily—perhaps in a challenge, or maybe Sid’s the one who needs to sleep---and smiles. It’s a mocking, unnerving sight, one that manners barely restrained last night at supper, but it’s easy all the same. It strikes him as strange, but nothing about him is suggestive of a threat.

In the silence, Shelton seems to say: _I got’im_.

Sid doesn’t want to leave the two of them alone, but he knows that this where he’s supposed to be right now. Despite his instincts telling him to stay, he turns and starts towards home, leaving the two of them alone.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


End file.
